New Media Consortium (NMC) Trends
https://www.turnkeymsp.net/ctu-cs875-unit-3-1/
The
Horizon Report detailed the importance of mental health supports and controls
with universities and organizations (Muscanell & EDUCAUSE, 2025). It provided several
recommendations on how to assess, structure, plan milestones, resources, and
suggested the use of some Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems to facilitate
mental health support and environment conducive to personal wellbeing. The report
goes into more detail on how it is the responsibility of every campus member to
be aware and supportive of mental health, and suggests that Learning Management
Systems (LMSs) provide a wide-array of resources and tools to accelerate
personal development, peer-driven environments, and mental health. They also
suggested that virtual reality therapy, telehealth, and AI-powered
technologies, which may not have completely been invented/developed yet, will
offer universities the ability to offer better and more mental health services
on a limited budget. Figure 1 shows a recommended roadmap to defining,
executing, and maintaining short, medium, and long-term objectives.
Figure 1
Action Roadmap, from 2025 EDUCAUSE
Horizon Action Plan: Mental Health Supports
Note: The Action Roadmap above Is just one recommended
graphical representation, by Muscanell & EDUCAUSE, 2025.
The
Horizon Report for Higher Education (2014) provides a creative classroom
research model, which includes infrastructure, content and curricula,
assessments, learning practices, teaching practices, organization, leadership
and values, and connectedness as innovative pedagogical practices. The report
shows a high demand for virtual learning management systems (LMSs), social
networking, and thinking of students as creators over consumers. Learning
management systems and virtual classrooms have come a long way in the past
decade, but the benefits may be lacking the quality of being in person.
Certainly, they increase a school’s revenue and service delivery, reaching
regions and students that would otherwise not be able to participate. However,
for the student, the learning environment is not as rich, live questions are
not always possible, and social networking online is not the same as being
around cohorts, from my experience of approximately six years in full-time
online classes across three degrees and universities. The flexibility has
certainly allowed me to continue attending, but the knowledge I have gained
seems to be less than expected by reciprocal careers (Johnson, Adams Becker, Estrada, & Freeman, 2014).
Artificial
Intelligence (AI) and Learning Management Systems (LMSs) have many great
features, including: digital data analysis, portability, cloud resources, and
student-specific insights and recommendations. Some AI LMSs have adaptive
content, tailored to students’ needs. I have mixed feelings about the need to
pay a school for this though, especially with the sentiment towards degree
holders, the Department of Education (DOE), and the high profits schools make
from software that translates into a no-guarantee outcome. While receiving the
platform, structure, sometime accreditations, and conferment of a degree, the
value of a degree has significantly decreased (over experience), while the
costs continue to go up (Pappas, 2024).
Education
alone cannot guarantee any particular outcome. it prepares students to solve
larger problems, can provide a level of credibility, and can be required for
some roles. Although, many states/employers are reducing degree requirements,
focused on Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) efforts for the past few years,
providing roles to highly underqualified agents while others, such as myself,
are detested. The Department of Education (DOE) is set to be abolished, H-1B
technical visa employees are preferred over highly-educated technical students
to save money, and likely get sponsored to come over here making hundreds of
thousands of dollars. Most employers will tell applicants that while they do
have a degree, they either: do not have the required experience/track record,
it does not mean they know how to work at that employer/role, they cost too
much, and may feel somewhat aggravated if they do not hold degrees themselves.
Some reports show a positive outlook for
graduates in 2025, but some also show over 50% of respondents with a
pessimistic outlook (Gray, 2024; McGlauflin, 2024). While the new push is for
“meritocracy”, it seems that the most important outcome is the bottom-line,
despite the ethical, moral, or legal disruption it causes. The top skill
employers seem to look for is problem solving, but school does not teach much
real-world problem solving (Gray, 2024).
Instead, they teach traditional methods, which have not been used in day-to-day
employer operations in many decades; they have plenty of software, Artificial
Intelligence (AI), and outsourced/cheaper employees for that. While the
foundational and extended knowledge can help solve problems, the push to AI-based
environments everywhere will significantly reduce the demand for original
thinking, and produce a labor force of searching specialists, when there is
human=input needed. Artificial Intelligence is certainly powerful, efficient,
and beneficial in many applications, but applying it across-the-board poses
several issues and challenges. Not only that, but in the United States,
nationwide themes change every four years.
References
Gray, K. (2024,
December 9). What Are Employers Looking for When Reviewing College
Students’ Resumes? Retrieved from naceweb.org:
https://www.naceweb.org/talent-acquisition/candidate-selection/what-are-employers-looking-for-when-reviewing-college-students-resumes
Johnson, L., Adams
Becker, S., Estrada, V., & Freeman, A. (2014). NMC Horizon Report:
2014 Higher Eeucation Edition. Austin, Texas: The New Media Consortium.
Retrieved from events.educause.edu:
https://events.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/HR2014.pdf
McGlauflin, P.
(2024, August 21). More than half of college seniors are pessimistic about
starting their careers, according to a new report. Retrieved from
hr-brew.com:
https://www.hr-brew.com/stories/2024/08/21/class-of-2025-career-pessimism-handshake
Muscanell, N.,
& EDUCAUSE. (2025). 2025 EDUCAUSE Horizon Action Plan: Mental Health
Supports. Retrieved from library.educase.edu:
https://library.educause.edu/-/media/files/library/2025/1/2025horizonactionplanmentalhealth.pdf
Pappas, C. (2024,
October 22). Top LMS Platforms With The Best AI Tools For Training And
Education In 2024. Retrieved from elearningindustry.com:
https://elearningindustry.com/best-ai-tools-for-training-and-education-top-lms-platforms
